Turrican started its journey back in the 90s as an iconic shooter by Factor 5. With releases across major platforms of its time including Amiga, SNES, Genesis, and Mega Drive, Turrican is one franchise that has been quiet for a long time with a release of the collection last year. However, teaming again with Factor 5, ININ Games has released two brand new volumes in the Turrican Anthology which come packed with ten action-packed titles in the franchise along with tons of bonuses, and never-before-seen artwork, and more. This is our review of the PS4 version of the Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 in which we shoot across various planets and defeat robotic enemies.
Combined, both volumes give you ten titles however on their own, each volume comes with five games out of which one title in each volume is a Score Attack variant of a title. The five titles included in Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 include Turrican, Turrican II – The Final Fight, Super Turrican, Super Turrican Director’s Cut, and Mega Turrican Score Attack. Turrican Anthology Vol. 2 include Turrican 3, Mega Turrican, Mega Turrican Director’s Cut, Super Turrican 2, and Super Turrican Score Attack. Both volumes are sold separately so you have to purchase two games to get access to the entire franchise and tons of additional content and bonuses. The features and bonus content are the same across both of the collections and the game treats each title separately so your progress and settings are always unique for each title.
The most amazing feature of both Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 is that all of the games in the volumes come packed with bonus content. Before you actually start playing a game, you are taken to a game menu that offers you various options about that particular volume. These features are the same across all of the ten games in the collections. Both titles offer a Standard Mode and a Challenge Mode. The Standard Mode is a much easier mode where you can use cheats, have multiple Save States to load from, and continue the game later, and tons of helping features such as rewind and more. The Challenge Mode offers no helping options however you can earn various Trophies for your troubles in this mode. Trophies are disabled in the Standard Mode so if you live collecting Trophies, you will need to suit up and play all of the titles like they are meant to be played, in the Challenge Mode.
Before jumping into either mode of the game, you can access various other things as well in the menu. There is a Cheats menu where you can activate various cheats in the game such as Invincibility, Unlimited Energy, and more. You can also view a Map – Atlas for each game which is one of my favorite features of this collection. You can view the entire map in this mode for each game and as you play and unlock various things in the game, they are marked on the map as well. You can turn on and off various layers and just play around the map and view it at your discretion at any time. There is an in-game Jukebox and there is a bonus Jukebox in the main menu of each Volume as well which features an exclusive soundtrack from all of the titles in that particular volume.
In the options menu, you have a wide variety of things to play around with in each department. Each of these settings completely affects the game’s behavior and how you can play them. There are options for changing the visuals of the game such as adding various filters such as CRT and setting the aspect ratio of the screen as well. You can play around with these until you get the desired visual result that you want from your gameplay experience. You can also switch to various Control schemes in the game such as the original Amiga, console or if you prefer, modern controls which are aimed at modern players to make the game more accessible to them.
There is also a gallery filled with tons of artwork that was never-before-released in any shape or form. Some of the bonus content in both volumes is initially locked and you must play the games first and unlock these options. It does not take you long to unlock all of these bonus features. You can listen to your favorite soundtrack and change how the music and sounds play out as well. You can choose the original soundtrack in its emulated form, a remastered version by none other than Chris Huelsbeck, the original creator of the soundtrack, or the modern take which is called the Turrican Soundtrack Anthology music. You can choose which cover to show in the main menu for each title and if you want to check them out, detailed manuals of each title in different languages. You just go crazy in the menu before actually playing the game itself.
There is a decent amount of content that is locked initially, which gives you a purpose to visit the titles and complete them first and I like this. Instead of just unlocking everything right at the start, you first must play and complete the titles before you can use different cheats in each title and unlock other bonus content for the whole volume or a single game. The settings, Saved States, and unlockables are unique to each game and you can set different settings for each game instead of just doing it again and again for each title separately. For an added challenge, you have the Challenge Mode as well if you find the games too easy or want to unlock the Trophies, you will need to play how the games were meant to be played back in the 90s. Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 brings enough challenge and content to keep you busy for hours.
I was first introduced to Turrican with Turrican Flashback which I reviewed last year and in that review, I mentioned that while this shooter is great on its own, compared to other titles, it feels a little dated because most of the 90s shooters were allowing you to shoot both up and down and at various angles instead of just forward and backward like in Turrican. Turrican Anthology brings all titles of Turrican Flashback as well in their best forms with newly added features so if you missed playing that, you can now jump directly into the two new volumes Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 and Turrican Anthology Vol. 2 to play all of the 10 releases in the franchise. Both volumes ship with different games but the same amount of bonus features and additional content making both of them a bargain.
Final Verdict:
Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 is a dream come true for retro lovers. If you missed playing this franchise when in the 90s or even the more recent Turrican Flashback from 2021, you can just jump in the Turrican Anthology Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 to get everything that this iconic franchise has to offer. Packed with tons of content and all of the original as well as their reworked editions, both volumes are a definitive edition to your collection. While the gameplay still feels a little dated, the franchise indeed has its moments and with bonus content locked behind progression and game completion, you will be spending quite a lot of time grinding through various planets and mowing through robotic enemies. Highly recommended for fans of retro games and collectors.
Final Score: 8.5/10
